It was SRO for Tom McCorry's demo
of Agricola -- rumored to be the hottest new game from
Europe.

Katharine McCorry did some proselytizing
too for her husband's latest Essen discovery which drew well
despite a shortage of games.

Barely off the Boat

Z-Man Games sponsored the vendor trial for Agricola
(Latin for farmer) and there was some question as to whether
the event would even occur since the English version of the game
did not land on these shores until just before the convention.
Indeed, the Sampler Showcase demo of the title had to make do
with European versions of the game as we anxiously checked the
mail each day for deliveries. Fortunately, the promised copies
arrived in time for the tournament, but one must wonder what
this event will draw next time when the English version has been
in distribution for a year.

Agricola is about a farmer and spouse developing their
house, family, fields, and livestock to have the most prosperous
and diverse farm at the end of 14 rounds. The game includes 300
occupation and minor improvement cards with each player only
getting 14 cards per game. The common action cards vary depending
on the number of players which makes for a high replay value
with one set of rules. This 2007 Essen Spiel release has surpassed
Puerto Rico as the highest rated game on BoardgameGeek.com
ratings.

For the tournament, we used the "Complex" set of
occupations/minor improvements in each round. Heat 1 used six
5-player games with one tournament rule: player 5 at the start
of the game received one extra piece of food (four instead of
three) which we have found neutralizes the perceived disadvantage
of starting 5th. The high score for the round went to Bob Crenshaw
with a 59 with "Legend" Dan Hoffman getting the highest
non-winning score of 47. Overall, the average score was 31 with
the average winning score being 46. It turned out that the 5th
position ended up with the highest average finishing score so
it looks like the house rule was not needed, or perhaps overkill.

Heat 2 used eight 4-player games. The average scores remained
the same (31) with the high score for the heat going to David
Platnick (53) and the highest non-winning score to Luke Koleszar
(44). Interestingly, it looks like there is a statistical disadvantage
going last in a four player game while the other three places
were statistically equal. The sample size is small but it will
be interesting to track as we get more tournament data.

The semi-finals consisted of four 3-player games with high
score going to David Platnick again (41) and the highest non-winning
score to Bob Crenshaw. The sample size was really small but the
player starting third won three of the four games. Moving on
to the Final (in start order for the round) and the starting
cards for each player with round played if used (* denotes card
received from another player):